


Monstrous

by pinkchubbiebunnie



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Blood, Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Self Confidence Issues, Self-Hatred, Underage Drinking, mentioned - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-09-06 12:04:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20291164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pinkchubbiebunnie/pseuds/pinkchubbiebunnie
Summary: You never wanted anyone to find out what you were. To find the secret you’d been hiding just beneath your sleeve for so many years… But when you got trapped in the secret underground facility with your boyfriend, Steve, and your new friend Robin, who you had come to love dearly, you knew that you couldn’t keep your secret any longer. It was something you had planned to take with you to the grave, but the grave wouldn’t be that far off if you kept your mouth shut much longer. Steve Harrington x Reader. Fluff and Angst.(Crossposted on Tumblr.)





	Monstrous

**Author's Note:**

> my first foray into the stranger things fandom. I love Steve. done for the prompt "were you ever going to tell me?" 
> 
> -Tanisha<3

The summer sun was beating against your closed curtain, turning your small bedroom into a late morning sauna. You were on your knees on the floor, your back giving off a slight ache as you shucked away a pile of (probably smelly) crumpled up jeans, clearing the space underneath your bed to continue looking for your other shoe.

“There you are, bastard,” You cursed quietly to yourself as you wrapped your fingers around the black canvas, pulling your other Converse out from under the depths of your bed.

You sat on the floor in a heap as you shoved it on and laced it up, grunting lightly when you finally heaved yourself back up to your full height. You looked in the mirror; your hair was perfectly teased, your outfit was expertly matched – a neon yellow tank top with contrasting black tiger stripes, the arm holes cut down low to show off the sides of your lacy black bra; high waisted black denim shorts that you had cut from a pair of old jeans, leaving a messy, frayed edge around the leg holes; and a pair of blinding neon pink tights that had been worn out by you, leaving them with runs, tatters, and holes in quite a few places. All topped off with your signature black converse, which were beaten to all shit, the white parts faded to a brownish yellow, scuffed up and softened by years of use.

But there was something missing.

Your right hand consciously brushed against your left wrist, and you went to your chest of drawers, going to the second drawer. Beside a pile of disorganized, tangled tights that desperately needed to be sorted and folded was a large pile of gloves. All kinds of them; lace gloves, woolen winter gloves, random wrist bands, stylish arm “warmers” with no fingers that came all the way up to your elbow. You chose one of those. A neon pink arm warmer (not that it was going to keep you at all warm, being made of thin cotton) (not that you wanted it to in the middle of summer) with the same black tiger stripes as your top. Just one, to be stylish. You went to slide it on over your left hand, eyes only lingering for a moment on the faded black marks in the center of your wrist.

_004_

It had haunted you all your life, and you tried not to focus on it too much. That’s why these gloves had become a part of your signature style, and no one, including your boyfriend Steve, was at all suspicious that you were so dedicated to wearing one at all times.

Nobody had any clue about the secret you had been hiding for so long.

...

The crisp air conditioned touch of the mall was a savior to your skin after the long trek across the burning parking lot.

The path to Scoops Ahoy was ingrained into your muscles by now, after coming here and walking straight to the ice cream shop every single day since the summer began. It was still fairly early, so the crowd was scattered, and you walked through the entrance to Scoops in a few quick moments.

Robin was manning the counter, leaning against the space beside the register and staring off into space with a look on her face that distinctly read that her brain was about to melt out her ears. The store was empty. Which was no surprise; you couldn’t imagine anyone who’d want ice cream before lunch.

She was so clearly spaced out that she didn’t acknowledge you until you were right in front of her.

“Hey,” She said quietly, her voice almost sleepy, pulling herself to her full height. She stretched widely, trying to shake some of the lulling tiredness from her bones as you reached into your messenger bag, pulling something out and dropping it onto the counter.

“I brought it for you,” You announced, nodding to the book you had just placed in front of her.

“_The Outsiders_.” She read the title quietly to herself, picking it up and inspecting it in detail. “I still don’t get how a book with no female characters can be any good,”

“There’s like... one female character,” It was no concession, because she was more of a prop than a person as far as the plot went. But you didn’t want to shake Robin’s taste from it before she even opened the cover. “But that’s not the point. It’s still a really good book. The male characters are only like – a veil. For all the emotions. It was written by a woman. I think,”

“You’re lucky I’m bored out of my mind over here,” She said as she opened it, flicking past the cover pages and starting to read.

“You’re lucky I brought you something to do,” You commented and she laughed lightly before she disappeared into the back, clearly looking for some peace to enjoy the book. “Your girlfriend is here!” She barked at Steve, and you heard a distinct snort and some quiet mumbling. You couldn’t help but laugh to yourself. Of course he was taking a nap back there.

“Baby!” He burst out the door with a wide smile on his face, still blinking the sleep from his eyes.

“Good morning, sleepy-head,” You joked sweetly, holding out your arms to him.

He came around the counter, embracing you tightly, wrapping his arms around your upper back as you tightly gripped his shoulders. He was hard and warm, his body comfortably familiar against you. You hummed in delight at the affection. He pulled back slightly, barely loosening his arms around you to look at your face.

“I missed you,” He gave you that stunning smile.

“I saw you like six hours ago,” You chuckled.

“It was a long, _agonizing_ six hours,” He replied dramatically.

You leaned up on your tippy toes and planted a deep kiss on his mouth, sighing happily when he gripped the nape of your neck, wanting to keep you in that kiss for as long as possible.

You heard an exaggerated gagging noise to your right, and Steve sighed in defeat as he pulled away from you.

“You two disgust me,” Robin was leaning out the opened sliding window, staring at you with mild disgust glossing over her eyes.

“You don’t have to look,” Steve snapped pointedly, his arm still hovering around your waist possessively. Your hand rested lightly in the middle of his chest, fingers mindlessly playing with the edge of his sailor bib.

“I don’t want to, numb nuts,” Robin sneered, throwing another name at Steve. You couldn’t help but giggle. Their banter was iconic. “But I have a question.” She looked to you. “Why the hell kind of name is Ponyboy?” She waved the book in front of her face, raising her eyebrows.

“Just wait.” You told her. “There’s a guy named Sodapop,”

“Sodapop?” She mumbled indignantly, ripping the book open again as she disappeared behind the wall.

...

You had a bad feeling about this Russian transmission.

Of course, you didn’t speak a lick of Russian, so you had no idea if the jumble of sounds coming out of Dustin’s tape recorder was complete nonsense or some kind of top secret code. But whenever he played it, it put a huge knot in your gut.

You gripped at your wrist, your thumb tracing over the spot of your tattoo through the fabric of your glove.

“You okay, babe?” Steve asked, his words slightly muffled by the banana he was scoffing down.

“Yeah,” You lied quickly. You used to feel guilty over lying to him like this, but it had happened so many times over the course of your relationship that you forced yourself to become numb to things like guilt, self hatred, the nightmareish visions of your past.

“You sure? You look kinda sick,” Steve was being his ever-caring self, and you couldn’t help but smile at him.

“Uh... yeah. I think I’m just kind of hungry,” You lied again. You knew it was stupid to be so upset over something as minor as a recording. It was probably nothing, that would lead to more nothing. Dustin was bored and his friends were ignoring him. Chasing invisible Russian conspiracies was way more fun than sitting around at home waiting for people you thought didn’t want you. It probably had absolutely nothing to do with... the Lab, or the people who’d put that number on your wrist.

“Hello, focus!” Dustin scolded you both. “We haven’t even gotten one word yet!”

“I am focused!” You snapped back to reality, putting on your brave face once again. You got up from your seat, hanging your bag on your shoulder. “I’ll go get provisions for this translation session. You guys want BK?”

...

“Well, we can look on the bright side...” Your voice echoed inside the empty metal room. “We’ve all been to Hawkins High. And everyone has seen you guys in those outfits. So at least this isn’t _the worst_ day of our lives,”

A round of tired laughter followed your attempt at comedy, breaking the anxious, scared tension that filled the room to the brim.

“You said I look cute in this outfit!” Steve feigned hurt at your comment, holding his bound hands over his heart. It made both you and Robin laugh even harder.

You, Robin, and Steve were tied up, your ankles and wrists bound, each of you seated against a different wall of the room. You supposed it was purposeful, the Russians not wanting you to conspire on an escape. Of course, escape was the only thing on your mind. A tight, tight knot had formed in your stomach, making you endlessly nauseous, making your neck ache with the tension. The ropes were tight against your wrists, strangling the fabric of your glove; likely causing chafing that would be there for weeks. Which would only be a problem if you lived for that long. It made you hyper-aware of your tattoo, the thing that marked you – your secret.

You had opened your mouth more than once now to tell them, to confess it all. But the words kept getting stuck in your throat. What if Steve thought you were a freak? Yeah, he was okay with Eleven; but he didn’t have to spend that much time around her. He wasn’t dating her. And her powers were... different than yours. What if he was afraid of you? What if he – what if he judged you for the things you’d done? For the things you’d had to do to survive?

“I can’t believe I’m gonna die in a secret Russian base with Steve Harrington and (Y/N) (L/N), wearing a fucking sailor costume,” Robin laid her head back against the wall, sighing deeply. “I never even got to finish that book...”

“You’re not gonna die here.” Steve had a small determination in his chest. It was his truth, his will. He had no clue how he was gonna make it happen. Especially not from this position; but he was going to save you. “Nobody’s gonna die here.” The last part faded off in his throat, sounding less hopeful as the words touched the air.

You opened your mouth again, and once again, the words got caught in your throat. You made a strangled noise, and both Robin and Steve looked over at you.

“What is it?” Steve questioned you.

You couldn’t stand to look at him right now. His eye swollen shut, his lip busted up, his nose swollen and most likely broken, his face and shirt covered in blood. He had been beaten to a pulp, and you were just sitting there, not doing anything about it. The nausea rose up further in your chest.

“(Y/N), seriously, what’s wrong?” He prodded further. You could feel his eyes – well, his good eye burning a hole into the side of your face.

You forced yourself to look at him. His stomach dropped at the sadness pooling in your eyes. When you mentally traced all the details of his broken face, still handsome but brutally warped by forces meant to do him harm: something in you finally snapped. You raised the rope around your wrists up to your mouth, making desperate bites at the thick material.

“Seriously?” Robin was shocked by your level of desperation. She had resigned herself to the fate long ago, and seeing you gnaw at the thickness of the rope with the smallness of your teeth just drove home how escaping this room was like trying to bail out the Titanic with a fishbowl.

“Yeah... I don’t think that’s gonna work...” Steve’s voice was shallow in your ear, and you sighed in defeat, dropping the harsh tasting material from your mouth.

“I think there’s a pair of scissors on that tray,” Robin pointed out, vaguely gesturing with her bound hands to the metal tray on a wheeled cart. “But good luck getting to it with your ankles tied up,”

It was a bold move. But you decided to make it. You couldn’t just sit here docile any longer. You leaned to the side, putting both your palms flat on the floor, bending your knees and wiggling awkwardly until your weight hand shifted onto your hands and knees.

“I like the effort, really, but we both know how coordinated you are, babe,” Steve used one of his nicknames for you, trying to play off his hopelessness and fear. He had a huge pit in his gut because he had gotten you into this mess. He had fucked it all up and now he couldn’t even save you. “You need me to bring up Twister night again?”

“Me and Nancy had almost a full bottle of Jack Daniels between us that night,” You reminded him as you wiggled your hands up the wall that your back had just been leaned against. You were slowly inching your way into an upright position, kneeling up taller than either who sat with judging eyes, ready to shoot down your plan and accept their oncoming death. “I was plastered. You can’t expect me to nail down left hand green when I can’t even find my own ass,”

Robin snorted in laughter at your comment. “So that’s what you popular kids would do at your parties? Get drunk and play Twister?” Her voice seemed to be stuck somewhere between shocked and deeply amused. Like she was finally discovering the deepest secrets of the earth and she wasn’t sure if she was impressed or not.

“Uh, well, it wasn’t _just_ Twister...” Steve stuttered out. Even in the face of such danger, he was still eager to defend the validity of his parties. He was a good host and he wanted everyone to know it.

“It was strip Twister.” You reminded him quickly, not at all shy to reveal your secrets to Robin. Even if you did manage to escape, you had gone through so much together at this point that you’d be willing to tell her almost anything. _Almost_ anything. Your mind went back to the tattoo on your wrist again, and a sickly wave went through you, causing you to sway with weakness. You were glad you didn’t lose your balance completely and fall over.

Your back was straightened out completely now, and you found yourself staring at the cold wall with a decision to make. You could either try to shuffle to the tray on your knees, and hurt yourself, fall over, and risk making a lot of noise if you accidentally knocked the tray over. Or, you could attempt to hop up onto your feet in one swift, smooth, movement and be a lot more mobile. Knowing you, it wouldn’t go successfully, but it was a much better idea.

“Strip Twister?” Robin’s voice interrupted your ponderings. She sounded curious and almost scandalized at the idea of a group of you playing such a game.

“Steve can turn anything into a stripping game.” You joked, and you heard Steve let out a huff from deep in his chest. You were speaking almost mindlessly, your brain entirely focused on your next move. But it was amusing to see that you had irritated him one last time. (Whether it was the last because you’d die here or because he’d break up with you after he found out what you were, you couldn’t be sure.) “Strip Poker, Strip Checkers, Strip Happy Days Game...”

You trailed off mindlessly. You curved your back just slightly, and put the very last of your energy into making the jump. It was slightly clumsy, and if you hadn’t taken a moment to steady yourself, you would have landed flat on your back.

(You heard Steve mumble “Nice going,” under his breath, clean and honest, at seeing your progress, but it was almost drowned out by Robin’s next comment.)

“Strip Happy Days Game?” She was more indignant by the second, and you smiled at the sound of it. You started making little hops, orienting yourself across the room. The hard part was over now – hopefully. “How do you even _play_ Strip Happy Days Game?”

“Whenever you get three Cool Points, you get to make someone take off a piece of clothing,” Steve’s voice was small, hovering somewhere between embarrassed and proud. “It was a really slow weekend, okay?”

“What’s a fast weekend like for you guys?” Robin’s pondering went unanswered because all attention was immediately turned to you when you seized the scissors from the tray. You looked at the orientation of the metal handle in your hands and quickly realized you wouldn’t be able to cut yourself out. “I honestly didn’t think you were gonna be able to do it,” Robin congratulated you in her own way.

“Yeah, well don’t celebrate yet, we’re still not home free. The door’s probably locked,” You reminded her. It had been hovering dangerously at the back of your mind. And now, as you hopped over to Steve and knelt beside him with the scissors, gently handing them to him so he could start cutting the ropes around your wrists, it became a harsh reality.

“And there’s an army of Russian guards waiting outside who all want to kill us,” Robin added, leaning her head back against the wall. She seemed oddly peaceful with the defeat.

“One mountain at a time, alright?” Steve posed this ideology quietly, trying not to let the two of you get too defeated, smiling at you with that same smile that said everything was going to be alright. Under the current circumstances, it just about broke your heart.

When the rope released from your wrists, it was more painful than relieving. You wiggled around in an odd way, getting your legs out in front of you and taking the scissors from Steve, cutting the bonds from around your ankles.

He then held his arms out to you in an expectant way, and your eyes ran over his face once again. Purple and red. The most horrible colours.

You had to do this now, while he was still tied up, while he couldn’t stop you.

You laid the scissors on the ground beside you and he gave you a funny look.

“Hey, what...?”

You cut him off before he could continue speaking.

“Promise you won’t get mad at me, alright?” Your voice shook with all the emotions that had built up inside you. All the guilt for having kept this secret from him, all the fear of having him find out, all the insecurity you felt for being this way.

You knew it wasn’t a promise he could actually make, something he could never truly guarantee, so you didn’t even let him respond. You just leaned forward and placed your lips on his, something beautiful and familiar – one last chance at comfort before you lost him forever. You placed your hand on the side of his face, and that was the key.

When your fingertips made contact with his skin, he was so caught up in kissing you, in trying to memorize the velvety feel of your lips like it was his last day on earth, that he barely noticed the intense warm tingling that began to form all across his face. It being most intense at the sights of his injuries; his eye, his nose, and the cut that formed out from his lip. By the time you pulled away, the tingling had ceased, and some part of his brain supposed it was just the shock and awe of having a last kiss with the person you truly love.

But when he blinked his eyes open in the harsh florescent light, and found that his left eye was actually opening all the way this time, he knew that something strange had happened to him.

You grabbed up the scissors, quickly cutting him lose before he started to freak out too much.

He used his now free hand to feel the cut on his face – which was now only smooth, untouched skin. Not even so much as a scar. The only thing he could feel was the rough grit of the dried blood sitting on top of his skin.

You snipped the rope around his ankles, trying hard not to burst into tears at the feeling of his eyes on you. You knew that he’d say something any moment now, and you weren’t sure if you wanted to find out what it was.

Robin had been staring at the whole scene in awe. She intentionally looked away when you kissed him, not just because she didn’t enjoy the PDA, but because she felt too awkward bearing witness to such a private moment. And when she had looked next, you were cutting Steve free and his face was completely healed. She was awestruck, and for once in her life, found herself with absolutely nothing to say.

“What the fuck did you do?” Steve’s voice cut through the air like a knife. A knife which he hurled at you, that immediately lodged itself into your spinal column. You wanted to collapse onto the floor in your weakness, but you busied yourself with cutting Robin free. You could feel her eyes on you too, and your breathing picked up as you tried desperately to keep your tears from spilling in front of them.

Steve opened his mouth to say something else, but before he could utter another syllable, the door beeped and you all froze, knowing this was the signal that unwanted company was about to enter. Robin finished shucking the rope off her ankles and curled her knees up to her chest, waiting. You couldn’t even look at Steve.

You knew it was absolutely pointless now to hide your abilities. Now you could do the one thing you were made for – killing. You were the perfect weapon to get these two innocent, good people to safety. God knows that they absolutely deserved to live, even if you didn’t.

“Get behind me.” Your voice was steady, despite the tears brimming your eyes, and neither of them hesitated to follow the command. They both jumped to their feet, coming to stand behind you where you faced the door just as it swung open.

The first man who stood in the doorway, the leader who had been interrogating all of you in English, opened his mouth, likely to yell at you or to bark commands at his subordinates to capture you because you were making an attempt at escape. You didn’t let the words leave his lungs. You raised your right hand, focusing all your energy on him, and curled your fingers in a distinct crushing motion.

It was a shocking image that you were surprised could be seen through the layers of his thick uniform, but as was your will, all his ribs broke off and curled inwards, instantly crushing his lungs, heart, esophagus, and many other important organs, making him collapse onto the floor. He cried out as his body dropped, and he men behind him just watched in shock, unsure of what was happening. He wriggled around a bit, still crying out in agony as he lay there. He would suffocate in a few moments.

“Holy shit,” You heard Steve mutter behind you.

Two more men stepped up next. They raised their guns and pointed them at you, but before they could shoot, you carefully focused in on their hands that rested on the triggers. You flicked your outstretched wrist in a quick, certain motion. Both of their wrists completely snapped in the opposite direction, causing bones to stick out, and gushes of blood to come spurting from them. As they yelled out in pain and pulled their injured limbs close to them, the three other men in the hallway stared at you with wide eyes, giving you a look that told you they just might run.

You weren’t willing to take that chance.

You made one last hard push, focusing in on all of them, going so deep that you could see their red blood cells. Pulling your fingers slowly into your palm in a smooth, far-too-practiced motion, you willed all those red blood cells to come rushing out from their bodies. In seconds, they started choking, sputtering, gasping for air. And the blood came pouring out of their ears, eyes, noses, and blowing from their mouths in droves, the liquid slowly muffling their gags and coughs. By the time the last one hit the floor, the sea of red had soaked into the bottom of your sneakers.

You felt a wave of guilt rush up at the pile of bodies sitting in front of you, and forced it down.

You were a monster; this is what you were made for. And everyone was going to know that now.

...

“**_Were you ever going to tell me_**?” Steve’s voice roared through the thickness of the night air, slicing open the silence that you had bathed yourself in.

You had been standing on the edge of the hill, overlooking the highway. After you’d accompanied Robin, Dustin, Erica and Steve safely to the radio tower, you were tempted to disappear. To just walk off somewhere; somewhere that nobody would ever find you again. Monsters deserved to live in the woods where no civil society would ever be touched by them.

Steve hadn’t said a word to you since you’d left the bunker, and you weren’t too keen on drawing first blood. It had been hours of a painstaking stale-mate, with only Dustin and you both making mandatory communication at others to whittle away at the tension.

It was a difficult question to tackle. You resisted the urge to cloak yourself in the comfort of silence, but still, you refused to look at him. You kept your eyes on the highway, feeling him watching your back with absolute determination, willing you to turn around. You wouldn’t.

“I didn’t want to.” You admitted honestly. “In my perfect version of the world, I would go my whole life without anybody ever finding out,”

“Why?” Steve sounded genuinely puzzled. “What’s so bad about it? You have fucking superpowers,” His words were gentle, almost bordering on a joke. Clearly he had no idea of the territory he was treading into.

You whipped around then; for some reason, this was the twig that broke the dam. You now found yourself completely ready to hurl all your emotions at him. No guard, no filter. Just your pure, honest words pouring from your mouth.

“I’m not some fucking superhero!” You snapped at him. “_I kill people_.” You let this statement hang in the air for a moment, hoping that the terrifying finality of it would actually penetrate his brain. “I’ve killed people. I have done and seen things that I never wanted you to know about,”

“Why?” He was getting offended now. “You didn’t think I could handle it? Did I not handle myself well enough today? Being held ho...”

You didn’t let him finish. “No. Of course not,” You pushed this silly notion out of his head. You paused for a moment, trying to find the right words for what you really meant. “I was terrified for anyone to find out. But _especially_ you. You’re my boyfriend. Or you were. I didn’t want you thinking that I’m some kind of – some kind of monster.” You said the last part very quietly, the words getting caught on the barbed wire that had lined itself inside your throat.

“Wait, _was_?” Steve was severely caught up on those words. “Are you breaking up with me?”

You shook your head profusely. “Of course not. I thought that you’d be breaking up with me. I honestly thought that you’d hate me.” The words fell in tumbling succession from your lips, unable to be tamed by your newfound thread of honesty. “You know... after you saw me murder a bunch of people.”

“Communists are people, (Y/N).” You weren’t even sure if this was a joke or not, but he cracked a small grin and you couldn’t help but burst into laughter at his words, his face, his smile. You put your head in your hands, trying to catch a breath from the conversation, and Steve stepped forward. Carefully, tenderly, he pulled you into a gentle embrace. You turned your hands slightly, balling them into the fabric of his stupid sailor shirt, gripping on tight as he wrapped his arms around your back and rested his head on top of yours. You pushed your head into his chest, taking a deep whiff – you wanted to remember that smell forever; wanted to remember the feeling of his hand gently rubbing up and down your back.

“I could never hate you.” He finally responded to your confessions with a serious thought. The tear that had been resting on your waterline, waiting for him, finally broke, absorbed by his shirt. “You make me so much better. When I met you I was just some two faced asshole who couldn’t get over Nancy Wheeler. And now... I’m a man who actually cares about someone other than himself,” He laid his truths on the table for you. You listened, soaking it all in; his scent, the rumbling of his words with your ear resting on his chest. “And not only did you make me better on the inside...” He placed a finger under your chin, gently lifting your head so you could look him in the eyes. He had wiped the blood off his face now, so he _almost_ resembled your average, everyday Steve. More sleep-deprived, more tussled. But he was still _yours_. “...but you made my outsides better, too. You’re so focused on the fact that you’ve killed people, but you’re a survivor. You clearly have the power to heal people as well. Don’t forget that.”

“Technically, I have the power to manipulate any human cells. So if I tried really hard, I could make people grow extra bones, or make your hair grow really fast in like a day. Or cure cancer,”

“Wait, seriously?”

“GRISWOLD FAMILY, DO YOU COPY? I REPEAT, GRISWOLD FAMILY, DO YOU COPY?” Dustin’s screams caught your attention, and you both looked over to where he was holding his walkie, staring at it, waiting for an answer.

It appeared, duty was calling you once again. 


End file.
